Macro Scenes:
- Big tech under pressure despite broad gains: The US stock markets finished higher to kick off the week, extending six-weekly gains. However, most mega-cap tech shares were lower, suggesting potential funds shift to smaller caps. Notably, the US small-cap index, Russel 2000, rose more than 10% on a monthly basis, outperforming the three major averages.
- USD strengthens: The US dollar index continued to climb ahead of the US November CPI data as bond yields jumped following last Friday’s strong job data despite a flat close on Monday.
- Yen weakened: The Japanese Yen weakened as traders reassessed BOJ’s policy path. According to Bloomberg, the bank may not be in a hurry to terminate its negative interest rate this month. However, it might have to normalize its monetary policy to avoid further weakness of the Yen.
- Gold fell below 2,000: Gold slumped amid a firmed USD. The precious metal continued to retreat from its all-time high level. The downside momentum may take the spot gold to test further potential support of the 100-day moving average around $1,941 per ounce.
- Bitcoin retreated: The world’s largest token retreated sharply, down nearly 7% in the last 24 hours. Bitcoin fell to close to 40,000 from the recent high of above 44,000. The selloff was most likely due to technical pullbacks, as a bearish divergence had been formed previously.
- Asian markets to open higher: The ASX 200 futures rose 0.26% the Hang Seng Index futures climbed 0.71%, and Nikkei 225 futures were up 0.98%.
